If approved, FADPA would allow copyright holders to obtain court orders requiring large Internet service providers (ISPs) and DNS resolvers to block access to pirate sites. The bill would amend existing copyright law to focus specifically on ‘foreign websites’ that are ‘primarily designed’ for copyright infringement.
The inclusion of DNS resolvers is significant. Major tech companies such as Google and Cloudflare offer DNS services internationally, raising the possibility of blocking orders having an effect worldwide. DNS providers with less than $100 million in annual revenue are excluded.
While site blocking is claimed to exist in more than 60 countries, DNS resolvers are typically not included in site blocking laws and regulations. These services have been targeted with blocking requests before but it’s certainly not standard.
It’s aimed at DNS resolvers, so folks better start busting out them Pi-Holes and setting up unbound.
These articles always get me thinking about filesharing doomsday. That theoretical point in time when our governments go full China and enact their own national firewalls/other scheme of effective P2P connection surveillance; when you need to know for certain that you’ve downloaded enough (and that your storage game is good enough) to last decades of leisure time, perhaps even a lifetime’s worth.